Was NOLA’s basketball rebirth expedited too much?

Maybe no word better describes the city of New Orleans over the past seven years and 11 months.

It’s come to mark a sense a pride, a sense of unity and a sense of togetherness that few cities have ever shared.

From Bourbon to the Bywater, Magazine to the Marigny, I can feel it now as much as I could outside Ernst Café Feb. 7, 2010 when there wasn’t a dry eye in town.

Now, another team owned by the once vilified now beloved Tom Benson seeks a rebirth of its own – the New Orleans Pelicans.

The color scheme representative of the city flag and the logo representative of the state bird make the Pelicans a greater symbol of our unique culture than the Hornets ever could.

Hell, the Bees were more out of place in the Crescent City than a bar that closes at 2.

And with the much-anticipated unveiling of the Pelicans’ jerseys now released, coupled with the colors and logos unveiled in months gone by, the superficial rebirth is complete.

All that’s well and good, but colors, logos and jerseys don’t win basketball games, and the Pelicans’ offseason moves have shown their intent to go from rags to riches quicker than Frank Lucas in American Gangster.

But have they mortgaged future greatness for immediate gratification, and has Benson’s age dripped down the flagpole to encourage a more aggressive approach?

Both fair questions.

Brief offseason recap: New Orleans traded its first-round pick this year (Nerlens Noel) and next year (top-5 protected) for Jrue Holiday and Philly’s second round pick (Pierre Jackson, who appears destined for Europe, not New Orleans). Additionally, New Orleans splurged by extending a four-year $44 million offer sheet to Tyreke Evans, a move that forced the “dumping” of Grevis Vasquez and Robin Lopez to make room for Evans’ monster cap slot.

Both moves were separate but significant. Let’s start with Holiday.

Some say the Pelicans gave up too much for Holiday when they could have signed Jeff Teague or Brandon Jennings for less or simply drafted Trey Burke, but I disagree. Holiday is a known commodity who is certainly a better player than Teague and Jennings while being a much safer bet than Burke. It’s tough to give up next year’s first-round pick in a draft that is projected to be one of the best ever, but a not-talked-about-enough factor of uneven NBA trades is that Holiday makes the Pelicans better and therefore changes the value of the pick. Plus the genius of Dell Demps protected the pick, so if NOLA doesn’t make the playoffs, a superstar like Andrew Wiggins or Jabari Parker could, although very unlikely, find his way to the Big Easy.

Side note: Let’s stop calling Holiday an All-Star just to make ourselves feel better. Sure he had a monster, and I mean monster, first half last year, but Derek Rose and Rajon Rondo couldn’t play due to injuries, opening up that spot. When ranking PGs, in no particular order you’ve got those two, Chris Paul, Steph Curry, Russell Westbrook, Tony Parker and possibly Deron Williams depending on which one we see. Then you can throw Holiday in there with Mike Conley, Ty Lawson, John Wall, Ricky Rubio, Uncle Drew and the carcass of Steve Nash in the next tier.

So All-Star or not, the Pelicans picked up a 23-year-old PG on a fair deal (four years $44 million) who is ranked 8-14 in the league at its strongest position for the sixth overall pick in a weak draft and a pick likely 12-18 in a strong draft. Because I’m New Orleans, and I don’t have Pat Riley to recruit stars to my team like Tech University recruited Jesus Shuttlesworth, I must give something to get something, and I’m making that deal 100 times out of 100.

Now here’s where things get dicey. With a solid starting lineup, bench and plenty of cap room in place, the Pelicans opted to expedite their rebirth this offseason by offering Tyreke Evans far above what many would consider his market value.

I’ll get into the X’s and O’s of how I feel Evans fits in with seemingly similar skill sets in a later column, but his acquisition is a clear and obvious sign that the Pelicans want to win and they want to win now – a decision that I firmly believe was guided from Benson at the top.

Don’t get me wrong. The team is clearly better with Evans than without Evans. He’ll make the Pelicans a borderline playoff team in the West. You’re not cracking the top-6 (Again, in no particular order: OKC, SA, Hou, LAC, Mem and GS). Denver is a question mark with the Danilo Gallinari injury, loss of AI and coaching change, but they’ve just got too much talent not to run teams out of the mile-high altitude at home to the tune of 50+ wins. So that places the Pelicans versus defenseless Dallas, Portland if they don’t trade LaMarcus Aldridge and Minnesota if they don’t trade Kevin Love for the right to get killed (or possibly steal a game or two and get us all fired up for the future) in round one. And don’t get me started Lakers fans. Start buying your lottery tickets now healthy Kobe or not.

But locking up Evans for four years practically guarantees that this is the player base you’ll be going to war with for the foreseeable future. After the Pelicans pick up Anthony Davis’ option in the next two seasons, they’ll have roughly $51 million to $52 million dedicated to five guys (salary cap is about $58 million). Then, Eric Gordon’s deal comes off the books after the 2015-16 season, coinciding perfectly with the team having to give then restricted free agent Davis his first big-money contract. Can you see why I love Dell so much?

If you need a minute to go get headache medicine, I understand. These numbers make my head hurt sometimes. But the gist is that the Pelicans have forfeited future big-time cap flexibility in the interest of shooting for the playoffs this year and establishing the team’s core now. Had Evans not been signed, would any of the studs in the 2014 free agent class agreed to play alongside Davis and Holiday? We’ll never know unless Gordon gets dumped for expiring deals (Danny Granger, anybody). Instead, the Pelicans chose not to bank on the unknown and settled on this as their core moving forward

Now what’s the ceiling for this group? If Davis turns into a monster down low like he very well could, if Eric Gordon stays healthy with the right attitude like we don’t know if he could, if Holiday continues improving, if Evans fits and if San Antonio and Memphis fall off like they soon should, I could absolutely see this base competing hard in a second-round series for a spot in the conference finals within three years.

My question to you: Is possibly the conference finals good enough or should have Demps avoided the quick fix and still left open the possibility of building a championship team (while also possibly falling flat and signing no one)?

Tough decision.

But I’m afraid it’s one Demps didn’t make solely on his own with an owner staring 86 in the face.

Benson already gave us one glorious rebirth. Is it fair to knock him for speeding up the next one possibly too much in the sunset of his life?

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